to 2 Corinthians chapter 1. The first chapter of 2 Corinthians. I wish to read beginning with
verse 3 and read through verse 7. Verse 3 through verse 7. Blessed be God, even the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God
of all comfort. who comfort us in all our tribulation,
that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble
by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. For as
the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also
aboundeth by Christ. And whether we be afflicted,
it is for your consolation and salvation or deliverance, which
is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which
we also suffer. Or whether we be comforted, it
is for your consolation and salvation. And our hope of you is steadfast,
knowing that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so shall ye
be also of the consolation. I wish to speak to you this morning
primarily out of verse three and verse four of our text here
that is before us this morning on how to view our tribulation,
how to view our trouble as God's people here in this world. I trust that the Lord has given
us this message and that the Lord has prepared our hearts
for what the day holds. I stand before you this morning
in much need of the grace of God to be strengthened to be
helped, to be encouraged, and physically I need to be helped
this morning. I took a flu shot on Tuesday
and have just been in and out of the flu symptoms ever since,
and I am quite weak and trembly as I stand before you this morning.
May the Lord be pleased to give us his help. Now, the Apostle
Paul was a much-tried man. I say he was indeed a much-tried
man. He lived in an age when I think
the people of God were, in a very peculiar way, tried. Now, the
persecutions of that time were very, very severe, and every
man who called himself a Christian, every man who testified that
he had the work of the Spirit in his heart, enabling him to
say and call Jesus Lord, had, as it were, to carry his life
in his hand. because of the severe persecution
and because of the enemy that were very mighty around them. We read in verse 8, Paul says,
For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble,
which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure,
above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life. But
we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should
not trust in ourselves, but in God, which raiseth the dead,
who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver, in
whom we trust, that he will yet deliver us." Now in this tribulation,
Paul seemed to have the largest share. And I think that it was
because he was the most prominent teacher and preacher that the
church had in that day. So therefore, he seemed to be
the butt of the errors of the wrath of the enemy. Now we have
here, I think, a little insight into Paul's inner life, here
in the text. He needed comfort, and bless
the Lord, he received comfort. In all of his tribulation and
in his afflictions, he needed comfort, and he received it.
And he had, I think, in such an abundance of comfort and consolation
from the Lord, from the hand of God, that he became a comforter
of others himself. Now in this text here that is
before us this morning, there are four things that I wish to
speak about for a little time. First of all, we have Paul's
practice here when it was being tried. He blessed God. When he had trouble, he blessed
the Lord. He blessed God. Now secondly,
he gives us the titles here which he has himself given to God. First of all, he calls God the
father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Then he says he's the father
of mercies. And then thirdly, he says he's
the God of all comfort. This is the God that Paul is
blessing. And then we have a fact too,
revealed in the text in verse four, who comforted us in all
our tribulation. meaning that God does indeed
comfort his people in all their tribulation. We'll have something
to say about that. And fourthly, the design of it
all. What is the Lord's design in
sending these tribulations, these sufferings, these afflictions
into the lives of his people? And that is that we may be able
to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith
we ourselves are comforted of God." Those are the things that
we'll be speaking to you about this morning out of this text. First of all then, to those of
you who may have come in here this morning quite burdened,
maybe even cast down, maybe troubled, mourning as you come in to this
building this morning, lamenting the trials and the heaviness
of the way and the difficulties of the way. We have here the
practice or the occupation of the Apostle Paul. Here, as we
said, is not a man who was a novice. And this is not a man who knew
nothing about affliction and suffering. This man was greatly
tried. We do not have time to go through
all of the passages that would reveal that to you, but I'm sure
that most of you are aware that this is an afflicted and tried
man that we're talking about here this morning. Here was a
man who never knew but what he might be dead the very next hour
that he walked the earth. He had many enemies, We mentioned
that they were cruel, they were mighty, and yet he spent a great
part of his time in praising and blessing God. He didn't spend
all of his time reflecting upon the possibility that suddenly
his life might be snatched from him and that he might be brought
to the hour of his departure from this world and but he spent
most of his time praising and blessing God. And in the 14 epistles
of the Apostle Paul, most of them begins with praise and adoration
unto the living God. Now this argues something. This
argues something to me, and that is that the heart of the Apostle
Paul was not crushed, it was not vanquished by his troubles. Now, this is very important that
we see this. Many, many times in life we feel
that we have just received such blows that we are crushed. We just simply are not able to
deal with the heavy, heavy trials and afflictions that are upon
us. But beloved, the Apostle Paul
had a practice, and he occupied himself in the midst of his trouble,
in the midst of his trial, by blessing God. And this argues
that his troubles and trials had not gotten the best of him. They had not pressed him down
to where he was not able to function as a child of God ought to function
in this world. Now, beloved, at this time I'd
like to say that we better not lose sight of, I hope we've not
lost sight of the fact, that we're God's spokesmen, that the
elect of God are God's spokesmen in this world, that we serve
the will of God in our generation, and that it is through the people
of God, through the elect of God, that God will send a message,
that he'll send a word out here to this world. And many, many
times we're unable to give that message. We're unable to speak
clearly. We're unable to say the things
that we ought to be able to say because we have not looked upon
our afflictions and our troubles as we ought. Our mouths have
been silenced. We sit sometime with a dumb spirit,
unable to say anything because we're crushed and overcome by
those things that have befallen us in this life. And we must
see that God would open our mouths and that he would give us insight
and understanding so that we could go forward and so that
we would have a word ready in season for those that are in
need. And we need to keep that uppermost
in our thinking. Paul knew that. Paul believed
that. Paul was sore beset in many ways
Yet he could say, and he did say, praise God, blessed be God. Blessed be God. Now Job, you
remember, was greatly tried and he was sorely bereaved, but still
he said, the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed
be the name of the Lord. And as long as we can keep the
blessing of God out front, in our lives, as long as we can
understand that the obligation of a Christian is not to sorrow,
not to sorrow, and not to weigh and re-weigh the afflictions
and the trouble that come into our lives. But the business of
our lives is to praise and glorify God, to bless the name of the
Lord, to set forth the glories of the God that we worship and
trust in. Beloved, as long as we can keep
the blessing of God out front in our daily lives, it's a sure
sign that whatever may have happened in our lives, we have not lost
our confidence in God, which hath great recompense of reward. Blessed be God. Blessed be God. Whatever has happened to you
is not worthy for you to give it the place where that it just
simply empties you out of praise and adoration unto God. You're
to remember to bless the Lord and as Job said, though he slay
me, yet I'm going to trust him. I'm going to go on and trust
God as long as he gives me breath. I'm going on to praise and adore
the Lord my God. Charles Haddon Spurgeon said,
You listen to this. He said, Yet will I trust him. Let him
do what he please with me. I have made no stipulation upon
him that I will only praise him when he does according to my
will. I will praise him when he has his own way with me, even
though it runs exactly contrary to mine. Now, beloved, that's
what I'm trying to get you to see this morning. The Apostle
Paul tried as he was, blessed God. That was his practice, that
was his obligation. And if you want to get above
your trouble, if you want to get beyond your trouble, beyond
your afflictions and your trials, make it your business to praise
and to bless the name of God when you're in under these afflictions. It is a brave heart. that still
under all pressure gives forth only this cry, blessed be God. It is a brave heart indeed. So
if you are in trouble and are afraid of being overcome by that
trouble, and the scripture says, be not overcome of evil, but
overcome evil with good, then beloved, take to praising God. Take to rejoicing in the Lord.
Take to blessing the name of the Lord. Get away from the present
trial by blessing His holy name. You know, beloved, when a man
blesses God for the bitter things, the Lord often sends him the
sweet. He often sends him the sweet. If you can praise God in the
night, the daylight is not for all. The poet said, pause not
to look behind for that which thou hast lost to find, be it
of earth or heaven. But look to God for more, for
better than you had before. Bold, enter at the open door,
and treble shall be given. Beloved, when you bless God for
the bitter things, the Lord often sends the sweet. He often sends
the sweet. If you can praise God in the
night, the daylight is not far off. It's not far off. So learn
to bless God when you're in trouble. Then there was a heart yet, and
I tell you this because I believe with all my heart that waited
and wanted to praise God, but the Lord soon gave them opportunities
of lifting up psalms and hymns and spiritual songs unto Him. If you want to, if you desire
to, to get above and beyond your affliction and trouble, then
God will soon give you the opportunity, and He'll give you the heart,
a heart, to bless Him and to praise Him. It shall never be
said that we were ready to praise God, but that God was not ready
to bless us, so praise God, and He will bless you. He will bless
you to keep on blessing Him. I give this as one of the shortest
and surest recipes for comfort. Just begin to praise and bless
God. Now our second point is the titles. which the apostle here gives
to God. And I like this, I like it a
great deal. I rejoice in these titles. Paul knew the Lord, did he not? He knew the Lord. And the first
thing he says here, he says, blessed be God, even the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be God even the father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. How near this brings God to us. Our father is the father of Jesus. He's the father of Christ. Christ
is our elder brother. God is the father of all believers
in Jesus Christ, and we're in God's family, and Christ is the
elder brother. Now, beloved, there more to it
than this. The Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, how
wonderful. He manifests His Father. The Lord Jesus. When I think
of Christ, you know most generally, well there's a lot of the traits
of the Father that is passed on to the Son. One of the bad
things about that is that not only are the things that are
praiseworthy passed on, but also the weaknesses and frailties
and tendency to evil and sin and corruption passed on from
the Father unto the Son, but not so in the case of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Not so. The Lord Jesus Christ,
the altogether lovely one, the one without spot or wrinkle or
any such thing, the one who expressed the Godhead perfectly. The Bible
says that he was the manifestation of the Godhead. He expressed
it. He was the expression of it in
a way of perfection. And so the Lord Jesus Christ,
there was no sin to be found in him. He was the son of the
great Father, Father God, Jesus Christ, his son. Now beloved,
the Bible very plainly says that Jesus is, you remember when Jesus
was talking to Philip, and Philip said, you show us the Father,
you show us your Father. And Jesus said, well, if you've
seen me, you've seen him. You've seen him. And so what
I'm trying to say is, Jesus, beloved, is the altogether lovely
one. Thanks be unto God, Paul said,
for his, thanks be unto God for his gift. for his unspeakable
gift, Paul said. What a comfort it is to know
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now we're told in Romans 8 and
32 that he, God, spared not his own son, but delivered him up
for us all. How shall he not also through
him freely give us all things? This God-man, this man who was
100% man, 100% God, Jesus Christ. I like what Paul said in Ephesians
chapter 1. If you have your Bible, you turn
there with me. Here we find language that Reminds us of our text in
verse 3. He says blessed be the God and
father of our Lord Jesus Christ Ephesians 1 3 who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. Now then Paul is blessing the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and then he says that
he's also blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ. in Christ. I like this. I do
not have, and I ask God to give me more and more, as I've been
in the way for a number of years, more and more of the ability
to set forth such verses and truths, the teachings of such
verses as Ephesians 1 and 3. But beloved, I still find myself
without adequate language to speak as I would like to about
the Father being the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. I know that it's a great mercy
that God has given us Christ. It's a great mercy. You know,
we often quote the verse in John 10, verses 28 and 29, where he
says, I give unto my sheep eternal life. And no man can pluck them
out of my hand. I give them eternal life, and
they shall never perish. Neither shall any man pluck them
out of my hand. And my Father which gave them me, which gave
them me. I like that expression. Christ
was given to us by the father. He says, my father which gave
them me. And so beloved, we have Christ
by a gift from his own father. He spared not his own son, but
delivered him up for us. We have no salvation apart from
him. No grace, no mercy, no life,
no light. Nothing but death apart from
God's gift, His Son, to us. And so Paul blessed God, even
the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so when you begin
to bless God, you have much to bless Him for, because you're
being seated in heavenly places in Christ now. It directly springs
from the Father. who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in His Son. And so I hope that doesn't muddy
the waters. I hope that that enables you
to see that this is indeed a great source of comfort to know that
God is the Father of the Lord Jesus. And that's the greatest
blessing. If He blessed us with this greatest of all blessings,
shall He not bless us with all the lesser blessings? Certainly
He will, and that's what all that means to me. So bless God. Bless God. Now next we see that
He is the Father of mercies. He's the father of mercies. Every mercy I have, every mercy
that I've ever had, has been begotten of God, who is the father
of mercies. Have you been a recipient of
mercy? Well, thank God I have. I have
been a recipient of God's mercy. I could never, never make it
on justice. I must have mercy. Mercy is for the guilty. There
was a woman one time who had a son who was guilty of treason
and he was to be shot. And so she goes to the king and
she pleads with the king that he would spare her son. He said, it would not be just
for me to spare your son. She says, I'm not asking for
justice, I'm asking for mercy. And that's the position that
every child of God takes before God Almighty. We come before
Him not petitioning Him ever for justice. We petition Him
for mercy. Beloved, let me point out to
you that if we were to receive justice, we'd all go to hell.
We'd be maybe in hell this morning if we got justice. Now you say,
well, now you mean that if a man gets justice, he'll for sure
go to hell? Listen to me, take a look at
Calvary's Mount. There the Lord Jesus Christ is
standing in my room instead. There he stands as the federal
representative of all God's elect. And what happened to the Lord
Jesus Christ? He was crucified. He was nailed
to that gory tree and he suffered the loss of his life. It was
the sword of divine vengeance that plunged into him and took
his life. And the reason was because he
got justice, the justice that was due the elect those that
God had chosen and given to his son. Those was the one he was
there representing. And so there's your justice,
my friend. The Bible says that he that sinneth,
he must die. Sin brings forth death, death. And so let us remember that,
that justice we cannot live. And here is the father of mercies.
And you come and you bless God. Say, I got some trouble. I'm
pressed down and I've got this trouble and that affliction and
other problems. Well, bless God, who is the Father
of all mercies. Bless Him that, number one, that
you're not in hell. Bless Him that you're still out
and still able to tell about His mercies. Bless Him. He's
the God of mercy. All temporal mercies come to
God's people from their Father. He blesses our tables, does He
not? He blesses our backs. And one old preacher, I never
will forget it, and I've often quoted it. He said that we drink
God's water in this world. He said we wear God's clothes
in this world. He said we're eating God's food
in this world. Mercies! He's the father of mercies. He blesses our tables and our
backs. In all common mercies, we see
a touch of the divine hand. Is it not true? Now, both temporal
and everlasting mercies arise from God. What a barren world
this would be. apart from the mercies of God
which endure forever. What a barren world! What a terrible,
waste-halling wilderness this would be if it had not been for
the mercies of God. Now seeing then that He is the
Father of mercies, can you not go to Him for all the mercy you
need? If your mercies seem to be few,
remember Hebrews chapter 4 and verse 16 where it says, Let us
therefore come boldly under the throne of grace that we may obtain
mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Do you remember
that old song, Showers of Blessing? What a wonderful song. I like
to sing that every once in a while. Mercy drops round me are falling,
but for the showers we plead. If you feel that your mercies
are few, go to the all-merciful God and beg him to send of his
mercies, because he is the God of all mercy. He's the God. He's the author of your mercies. So bless Him. Bless Him. He's
the Father of your mercies. Now the next title is that He's
the God of all comfort. He's the God of all comfort.
In other words, if you're going to get any comfort, Whatever
it be, suffer as you might, be raw as you might be, be troubled
and perplexed and vexed as you might be, be cast down as you
very well may be. Listen, if you're going to get
any comfort, it's got to come from God. And Paul said, bless
the God who is the God of all comfort. Bless Him. All sorts
of comforts are stored up in God. He has just the kind of
comfort that you need, whatever your situation may be. Have you
grown weary because of the trials and the heaviness of the way? is to you. He is the God of all
comfort. He's the God of all comfort,
regardless of how terrible your wilderness may be. And we said
earlier, it's a waste, howling wilderness that we live in here
in this world, a dry and barren place. But God is the God of
all comfort, not merely of some comfort, but of all real, true
comfort. All the comfort. Now, somebody
said, well, I get a little comfort. I've heard people say it. I get
a little comfort out of the whiskey bottle. Well, now, beloved, that
kind of comfort only brings misery, misery, and misery. You may get
a little comfort for an hour or two, but down the road, it's
going to just be the opposite. And it'll come to the place.
Believe you me, it will come to the place in time. Whatever
comfort you get in an unlawful way, and when you get comfort
that in some way or another is not from the hand of God, that
comfort's gonna ruin you and it'll all your life, it will
destroy you. The comfort we're talking about
is that comfort that is from God that will benefit your soul,
that will edify your heart, and that will be that which you really
deeply need in your very spiritual heart. If you need every kind
of comfort that was ever given to men, God has it in reserve. and he can give it to you, whatever
it might be. If there are any comforts to
be found by the people of God in sickness, in want, in depression,
in bereavement, in death, it will and must come from this
God of all comfort. So, beloved, if there is any
to be had It's from this God. So you can bless Him. You can
bless your God because all comfort is with Him. It's not a creature
who supplies the comfort that we have. It is only the Creator. Now listen to me carefully. The
creature or the comfort may be brought to us by a creature and
brought in the name of God. but it must come from him. And I certainly have been comforted
many, many a time by the children of God in various and sundry
ways. And there are those here that
have been a real comfort and blessing to my heart. And I praise
God for that. And I recognize, and we all must,
that the author of that comfort, even though it come through the
hand of one of his creatures, one of his children, Steal God. is the author of that comfort.
That comfort comes from God. Comes from his hand. The reason
why bread feeds you and medicine heals you is because God chooses
to make it do so. It's the hand of the Lord in
the matter. It's the fact that God's involved in everything
and it is God who must work with the means. Is that right? It
is God that must do it. And so we must trace his hand.
back to it all and we have the creator himself as our comforter
we have the creator himself as our preserver we have the creator
himself as the caretaker of our lives, who performs all things
that are appointed for us. Now then, that brings me to the
third thing, and I must hasten on because the time's getting
away, and that is the fact that Paul is talking about here in
verse four, who comforted us in all our tribulation. He says
that God comforts us in all our trouble, in all our tribulation.
Now this was Paul's declaration. This is what he said. He said
the Lord comforts us in all our trouble, in all our tribulation. The Lord does it. He does indeed. Now, he said we ought to be blessing
God because he's the God of all comfort, the Father of mercies,
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, but he does actually
comfort us. Experimentally, we know it's
true, Paul says, he comforts us in all of our troubles. It
is not only true of Paul and the Christians of his day, but
it's true also of us. The God of all comfort has comforted
us in our tribulation, and if you keep a diary, I don't. But
if you do keep one, I'm sure you can turn back in the pages
of the diary if you've been in the way of the Lord for any length
of time, and you will be able to see, as you have it written
down, that the Lord has comforted you on many occasions. I speak
for myself. I know it to be true, and I can
cite dates, and I can give you places and times, and I can go
through all of that, even though I don't have it written down.
It's written on my heart. I know. that the Lord has been
very gracious to me in my afflictions. I know the Lord has comforted
me in my troubles. I know it of a truth." Now Paul
speaks here in the present tense, who comforted us in all our tribulation. God is now comforting us who
believe in his Son. If you came in here this morning
heavy of heart, burdened down, distressed, mourning over your
situation and your lot in life, feeling greatly the pains of
affliction and trouble, then I hope some of this heaviness,
some of this, has gone away by now in this service. That the
Lord has given you a lift in your heart, that he's drawn near,
that he's comforted you even now, this morning, right now,
while this service is going on. The Bible says, cast thy burden
Upon the Lord he shall sustain thee. He shall never suffer the
righteous to be moved. He will not leave us comfortless.
He will come to us and comfort us in all our troubles. The Lord will do that. Now the
text is true also of the future as well as the present. He has
comforted, he is comforting, and he will comfort. I read the
story of an old lady who was 75 years old. And she became
very, very anxious, very, very troubled. She felt that she would
most surely end up in a poor house and starve to death. Somebody
asked her, how long have you been a Christian? 50 years I've
been a Christian. And you're very worried and you're
fretting and you're very, very fearful that you're going to
starve to death and you've been a Christian for 50 years. My
brother, my sister, the Lord has comforted, he is comforting,
and he will continue to comfort. God will not forsake his people. The feet of his saints are preserved
forever, and he will never forsake his people. He will never forsake
them. David said, I was young, now
I'm old, yet I've never once seen the righteous forsaken,
nor his seed begging bread. The Lord is faithful. He said,
I will never leave thee nor forsake thee, so that you may boldly
say, the Lord is my helper, and you need not fear what man shall
do unto you. Trust the Lord. Believe Him. He is a God of comfort. As your
days, so shall your strength be. The Lord does comfort His
people. He has, He will, and we need
to trust Him and believe on Him. Now then, lastly, the design. of which the text speaks. Why
does God lay trouble at your door? Why does God lay trouble
upon his people and then turn right around and comfort them
in their trouble, in their distress, in their difficulties? Why does
he do this? Well, it is that he may make them comforters of
others. Listen to it, that we may be
able, who comfort us in all our tribulation, that we may be able
to comfort them which are in any trouble. That's the reason
why the Lord does that. Now you see, that's a little
different view of trouble than what maybe we've ever taken before.
Most of the time when we have trouble, our first thought is
the Lord is mad at us, the Lord is angry with us, the Lord is
upset with us, the Lord is going to prune, He is going to strip
us, the Lord is going to deal harshly with us, the Lord is
going to afflict us because we've displeased Him. But you know,
Paul said, for as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, the sufferings
and the afflictions that come to God's people, the trouble
that they have, These troubles, now I'm talking to those that
are in Christ. These troubles, these afflictions,
these problems, they come to them by virtue of the fact that
they are in Christ. And because God's purpose in
their life involves this suffering, this affliction, these trials.
God's purpose involves this. and that if we are going to be
what we ought to be, serving the will of God in our generation,
these troubles had to come into our lives. And God has a purpose
for every trouble that comes into the lives of His children.
Now I know that you may go out here in the world and you may
find identical problems in the lives of the lost, in the lives
of those that are outside of Christ. The difference is the
afflictions and the trials and the troubles in the lives of
God's people are sanctified afflictions. They're sanctified troubles.
They're sanctified trials. And those in the world are not.
And those sorrows that are in those people's lives are sorrow
to death. But in the people of God, it
brings sorrow many times to repentance, genuine repentance, and it brings
sorrow to where that we're able to be comforted and enabled to
be comforters of others, that we may be able to comfort them
which are in any trouble. Now, a man who has never had
any trouble is very awkward when he tries to comfort troubled
hearts. You get somebody who's got his
hand in a wound, and his hand, he's never been afflicted himself,
never had a wound similar, and that individual can just simply
create havoc, and he can ruin an individual for whom Christ
died. Not that that individual be lost,
but he can wreck that individual, and he can destroy that individual's
joy, and life for a number of years. The preacher, if he's
to be of much use in God's service, he must have some trouble. Prayer, meditation, and affliction
are the three things that makes the minister of God an old writer
whose name I cannot pronounce. said long ago, there must be
prayer, there must be meditation, and there must be affliction.
It is God's will that we comfort one another, that we have a word
of comfort for one another. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith your God. These comforting men are to be
made, they are not born able to comfort God's people. Now
that's very important to see. They must be made. Comforters
in Zion must be made. They are not born coming forth
from the womb able to comfort God's poor and afflicted family. They can only do so as they themselves
go through such sufferings as God designs and sends into their
lives, enabling them to experience what they must experience from
God's hand to be able to assist and to help the poor, afflicted
people of God. They are not born so, and they
have to be made by passing through the furnace themselves. They
gotta be made. They cannot comfort others unless
they have had trouble and have been comforted in it. We are
to be made able comforters. We know what Paul said, that
we may be able to comfort any which are in any trouble, may
be able to do it. So miserable comforters are you
all, Job said to his friends, and the same can be said of many
that I've crossed paths with in my time. God deliver us. from some of the miserable comforters
that are out here in the world trying to administer in the name
of the Lord some of their own home growing brand of comfort
to the Lord's people. I don't want anything to do with
it and I admonish you to run from it as quick as you can.
Brethren, the able comforter must be those who know both the
trial and the promise that is suited to that trial. They must
know how to administer God's word and God's remedy to the
trial. Experiential knowledge helps
a man to speak with power to the afflicted soul. The afflicted
soul knows when the fellow speaking to him has a little bit of knowledge,
when he knows what he's talking about. The afflicted soul, the
truly afflicted soul, when led of the Spirit of God to hear
what somebody else has to say that has been through the furnace,
knows it immediately. This individual knows what he's
talking about. He knows what he's talking about.
He's been up the tree and the bear's been after him, and he's
been out on the limb. And somebody's been about to
sort off. This guy knows where he's at. He knows where he's coming from.
He knows what this is all about. He knows something about the
affliction. The Lord often sins, and I believe
this to be true. You know, there's some preachers
that have the ability to preach to the congregations that God
has put them in and over, and they have very little ability
to preach anywhere else at that time in those years that God
has placed them in a certain place and they seem just to simply
have the message for that place and for those people that the
Lord has placed them over and their ability otherwise is limited
in many, many ways. And that is because the Lord,
in a peculiar way, has led that individual, has dealt with that
individual so as to prepare them just to deal with that people. And maybe in some time in the
future, Maybe something that they have written or something
on a tape or something they've spoken might be helpful to other
people. And maybe it would be now if
it was more widely circulated. Only God knows that. But I have
found by experience there are people that are able, quite able,
to minister to their own people who are not able to do so much
anywhere else where they go. The Lord often sends his preachers
through trials which they would have never had to endure if it
were not for their people. If it were not for what they
had to deal with in the lives of their people, they wouldn't
have had to go through what they went through. God had a reason
to do it, and it was many, many times, it's some of the afflictions
of Christ that that individual suffers for Christ's sake. Even
as upon the chief shepherd, here's the way one writer put it, Even
as upon the chief shepherd all the wanderings of the flock had
to be laid, so in a very minor sense the wanderings of the flock
must be borne by the under-shepherd, or else he cannot be a comforter
to them. Very well put, I think. I think
that's true. The next time we get into trouble
then we ought to keep notes how God comforts us and one of these
days we are going to need to get out that diary and we're
going to say now listen friend I know what you're going through
and I got it right down here in black and white what the Lord
blessed of my heart here's how the Lord comforted me and I'd
like to share this with you. That would be God's way in dealing
through your life to others. An old writer wrote, whenever,
and this is very good, now you get this, he wrote, whenever
thou comest into the mouth of the furnace, say to thyself,
God has some great work for me to do, and he's preparing me
for it. Now isn't that an entirely different
way of looking at trial and looking at the mouth of the furnace?
It is indeed. I've not often, if ever, thought
of trials like that. Have you? I've always thought,
as I said earlier, that the Lord's with me, there's something that's
wrong with me, and this is why all of this is happening, that
I've just brought it upon myself, but the Lord opens the mouth
of the furnace, and He's the one that brings us in it. I believe this is true. that
when we come to the mouth of the furnace, we ought to say
the Lord is preparing us for something that we're to do. God
means to do something more by us. Which, speaking after the
manner of men, He cannot yet do by us until we've gone through
the furnace. We're not qualified yet in the
furnace. The furnace must be hotter. It
must be hotter, and we don't look upon that in the flesh with
pleasure. We do not. We do not. Somebody
said we ought to say welcome when trouble comes. Jesus said
in the world you'll have tribulation. He said we're going to have it,
so welcome it when it comes. I will not go that far. I am
too timid. I've had too much of it. No, let me take that back. I
have not had too much of it. I've had what the Lord sent to
me, and I'm sure there'll be more if I live longer, and it'll
be all right. It comes from the hand of my
Heavenly Father, who's an all-wise God, too wise to err and too
holy not to do right. If it comes from His hand, it'll
be all right. But I've had my share, I think, of trouble. And
I really don't look forward in the flesh. Do you? You don't
look forward in the flesh to trouble. I know it's just like
chastisement. No chastisement for the present
seems to be joyous, but grievous. And so it is. God means to do
something more by us. And when we come out of the furnace,
we'll be more fit, more fit for the matters that are at hand,
for the master's use when we come out of the furnace. If God
ever blesses us to comfort others, it probably will be because of
or through the very trials that now lay heavily upon us. Let's think of it that way. I
think that's wonderful to be able to think of it that way.
If God ever uses you and blesses you to help somebody, it'll be
because of the trial that's upon you today. And you'll experience
help from God. Paul said, who comforted us in
all our tribulations. You're going to get it. Brother,
you're going to get it. You're going to get the help, and you're
going to be able to help others. Wait on the Lord. I want to be
used of God to help others, so they'll not have to suffer as
I did if I can help it. I've stumbled an awful lot in
my life. I've had great difficulties coming
to what measure of truth that I've come to. Struggled. But
I believe most of God's dear children do. I believe they do. And may God bless you all who
have found mercy to administer that mercy in the name of God
to the glory of God to those who are longing to find it. Look
around, have your eyes open for those that are suffering and
attempt to find out if you can minister to them and help them.
And if there's any connection between what you've experienced
and what they're experiencing, then attempt to minister. That's
the design of the text. That's why God afflicts. his
family is so that they'll be able to comfort those who need
to be comforted. Father, in the name of Jesus,
we thank you for this privilege this morning. We ask that these
truths, these Bible truths, may live in our hearts and that we
may have victory. But Father, we all together with
one heart at this time would bless, would bless thy name. We bless Thee, God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, Father of mercies, God of all comfort. We bless Thee. We praise Thee. We adore Thee. We glory in Thee. We love Thee. We, our Father,
are ashamed of any, any, any time when we mishandled our trials. and we ask that your forgiveness
may be with us and that we may be greatly strengthened and helped
we are so weak the spirit is willing the flesh is weak and
we are weak indeed the bible speaks of women as being the
weaker vessel but that only means that man is weak and father we
ask that you would minister to us Give us strength, spiritual
strength. Give us the backbone that we
need to be all that we ought to be and serve Thy will in this
generation. Grant us Thy help. We thank You
for all those who have been a comfort to us, who You sent into our
lives to be a comfort to us. We thank Thee in Jesus' name. Amen.